When the eye cancer retinoblastoma is diagnosed in racial and ethnic minority children whose families don't have private health insurance, it often takes a more invasive course than in other children, probably because of delays in diagnosis, according to researchers at Dana-Farber/Children's Hospital Cancer Center in Boston.

Strong social connections may make it harder for some people who live in low-income, minority communities to lead a healthy lifestyle, report Dana-Farber and Harvard School of Public Health researchers.

Dana-Farber president Edward J. Benz, MD, comments on a report showing decline in rates of death in the U.S. from all cancers for men and women. The findings come from the latest Annual Report to the Nation on the Status of Cancer.

Survey results reveal differences in providing effective treatment of
children with cancer in resource-rich and resource-limited settings.
Raising the survival rate of children with sarcoma in low-income
countries will require steps to diagnose the disease sooner, train
cancer pathologists, expand radiation